Design 2D: Project 2 - Principles of Gestalt

For this project we were required to create 4 designs that demonstrate each demonstrate the following 4 gestalt principles: Closure, Similarity, Proximity, and Continuance. The goal was for each design to demonstrate one of the principles as clearly as possible, so much so that someone could identify which principle each plate is demonstrating just from looking at them.

Similarity: For this plate I originally was going to do a few different styles of planets, but decided for clarity's sake to use just one planet shape. I also originally had the planet rings separate shapes that divided the body of the planets into two shapes, but realized that was using closure and might distract from the use of similarity.

Proximity: For this plate I relied solely on stars, and made sure to avoid any grouping by similarity. I did this by using the same star shape I created for every star, and only slightly altered the size and rotation of each.

Closure: For this plate I let the moon fall off the frame to use closure for filling in the missing information. This plate also uses closure more subtly, in that the moon is really just 2 circles, 1 white and 1 black. The closing of the circles where their edges disappear employs closure. This effect, however, would be more effective if the gap to be closed was smaller.

Continuance: For this plate, I originally used a tree shaped similar to an arrow to guide the viewer upward. However, I didn't feel that was very strong, and found the telescope much more interesting. The nature of the telescope guides you to see what it's looking at, and the subtle shadow of the telescope further hints that there is something up there, bright and important. I made the lines of the hills taper at the ends and grow thickest at the telescope to help guide the viewer to the telescope

All in all, I felt this project went much better than the first one. I took a great deal of consideration into how each plate might be misconstrued as a different principle, and made alterations to clarify those. I also enjoyed it more simply for the objective design I did to unify the plates.

To see more of the process on dropmark, click here.